


The Glorious Not

by igrab



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-28
Updated: 2011-12-28
Packaged: 2017-10-28 07:25:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/305318
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igrab/pseuds/igrab
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It is quite a fine thing, to be young and in love and utterly unable to express it in any coherent way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Glorious Not

It was three days before my friend brought the matter up again, for he has a saint's patience and knows well how to wait. I had not been at my best on that day; he knew it utterly, and kept his questions to himself while I told my story. A lovely story - full of mutinies and deadly letters and all sorts of nonsense. He was dying to know if any of it was true. I am no longer sure. The parts I've forgotten I filled in; it could very well have been the truth, as my instincts are generally more clever than I. But I did not know.

It was not what he really wished to ask of me.

"That Trevor fellow," he started out, gentle and amiable as was his nature.

I nodded to let him know that I understood and knew where this was likely going, and also acknowledging his cleverness in waiting. He grinned.

"I was wondering - when you say 'friend', did you mean - "

"Were we lovers?" I cut him off in a terribly rude way, but he was surely used to it at this stage of our lives. It did not excuse me, but he failed to notice the slight at all. It was these small moments that I cherished, which is why I spend too much time discussing them, for it was in the unspoken and the meaning of things that Dr. Watson truly shone. For that, I was grateful. Perhaps now more than ever, what with the subject at hand. "...Yes. But to answer your second question - no. He was not my first, but that is a story for another time."

"You've been saying that for years," he teased softly.

"And I will continue to say it until the time is right. Shall I speak of Victor Trevor? That is what you wanted, isn't it?"

Watson waved a hand and sat down at his desk, presumably to sort manuscripts. I gave him ten minutes before forgetting about them entirely, and that was a rather large estimate. He _was_ trying, though, which was something. Eventually we would get our things packed. In our lifetimes would be preferable. For all our talk of a precious country home, Baker Street was astoundingly resilient. So full of memories.

I continued to pack chemistry equipment while I told a story, one much more pleasant than the story of three days previous, though not, perhaps, much happier. Well, we were happy at the time, I suppose. It is only in retrospect that the thing took on a sourness and dark edges, for once the truth is uncovered, it cannot be forgotten.

•

  
This is a meadow somewhere in the county of Norfolk, and in it are two boys - boys who would never deign to be called boys, as they would much like to think of themselves as men. Their passions in life are literature and boxing and each other, and it is for this last passion that they have availed themselves of this meadow, which is notable only for its complete and utter seclusion from the world. It is quite a fine thing, to be young and in love and utterly unable to express it in any coherent way.

One of them is bright and fiery. He is the one who persisted after the other, who insisted, who cajoled, who found this meadow and came leaping to the other with great excitement in his voice that they _must_ explore it. The other, who is long-limbed and darkly romantic, was particularly skilled at reading between the lines and easily translated what the other was up to. He went along; because that was what he did. He had never had a friend before. At that time, he believed the other to be the same. He was not yet as skilled at reading people as he would one day be.

Not, however, for lack of skill. He was _observant_ , of course - to a fault, even, but observant and practiced and willing to put into practice said observance are all very different things.

"Sherlock," the bright one said, referring to his companion, "we don't have to if you don't want to."

And Sherlock, not being very used to emotions, confused fear with nervousness and infatuation with love. "I want to," he said, _willing_ his voice not to shake and his body to stay relaxed, though it waited eagerly to tense when he stopped paying attention. "It's fine. It's nothing. Go ahead."

It is not 'nothing', it is not 'fine', there are too many bad memories but Sherlock desperately, painfully needs to make new ones. This time will be better, he says. It will be different.

•

  
The next day, a man named Hudson arrives, and Sherlock takes his leave. The manner of his leaving is somewhat unclear - his companion had appeared about to ask him something, with a very uncomfortable expression, and Sherlock flew to conclusions that he must be a 'source of embarrassment', as Hudson was clearly an old family friend, no matter what Sherlock thought of him. "If you don't mind, I'll leave on the morning train," he said quickly, before his somewhat-more-than-friend could speak.

"Er," he said. "Yes, I think that might be for the best."

Sherlock half-expects to meet him that night. He isn't at all sure how these things go, though (properly, at least, though none of this could ever be called proper). He supposes - once again through a lightning-quick chain of infallible deductions - that Victor would not want to risk it, with Hudson about. He therefore sleeps soundly, wakes early, and is on the train without even so much as a kiss goodbye.

He settles into his chemical experiments and forgets all about Victor Trevor.

For a day and a half.

He finds himself, unexpectedly, thinking of Victor's hands when he ought to be thinking of reaction agents, and consequently makes an awful mess that he knows he'll have to clean. As he cleans, he thinks of Trevor Sr said - that he might be a detective. Could he? He would hate working with the police. He was too much of a criminal to be so close.

A crime. Was it a crime, then, to love? He scrubs vigorously and thinks about Victor's soothing words and his repeated assurances, and promises himself that it will be better the next time. He'll be less nervous; more skilled, somehow. He won't be a disappointment.

So really, he couldn't be a detective. He was going to be a chemist or a violinist or a boxer and he would never marry and keep far, far away from the police force.

He sends Victor exactly five letters over the rest of the holiday, with a rate greatly resembling a backwards Fibonacci sequence. The longest interval was the first, then they got progressively shorter until he sends two off in one day, then smacks himself with his hat and plays his violin all through the night and well past dawn. They are all about the weather (at a chemical level), and he receives no replies.

•

  
He only sees Victor Trevor once more in his life. He receives a telegram and rushes off, certain that his friend's reticence was due to Hudson's continued presence and now, perhaps, he has gone.

Instead, he finds a dead man, a gruesome story, and a broken man who was once - briefly - his lover.

Obviously, it is not the time.

•

  
"...and then I met you," I finished abruptly, and Watson - who had abandoned his packing efforts in a mere three minutes - gave me a rather doubting glare.

"There's quite a bit missing in the middle," he said.

"Nothing important." I smiled, well and truly. I'd learned that from Watson as well. "It was your deft hand that taught me how to take joy as well as give it, and showed me the truth in my first incorrect deduction."

"Oh, for - " He was embarrassed, as he always was when I complimented him so frankly. So he chose to respond to my narcissism; when, in truth, that is why I put it there. "You've can't've been right all up until college."

I smiled like a cat, teasing. "First _phenomenally_ incorrect deduction, then."

Watson's face went serious of a sudden, and for a moment I had to scramble to understand why. He will keep drawing me back with this, among many other things. He can still surprise me.

"...Was he very cruel with you?" he asked, and I suddenly understood.

"Oh, heavens no. The man was a saint. But I'd mentioned he wasn't the first, and I believe he expected better." I tapped my fingers together, appearing to think it over. I had worked this all out already, years ago, but Watson needn't know when or where. "Yes. He did not know what to make of me because I wouldn't let him; I believed that he loved me, and he believed I was a rather bad lay." My mouth cracked in a broken, sardonic smile - the only kind I knew, once upon a time.

Watson's hands stilled and he sighed. I knew I'd hurt him, but it was the truth, and that, too, he knew. He was marvelously accepting of what darkness I let him see. As the years went by, it dwindled until there was barely any left, and still he accepted. Still, he loved.

I stood and went to him, placed my arms around his neck and bent to kiss the balding line of his hair. "Dearest, it was long ago and far away, and I hadn't even thought of him in decades. Weren't you packing your notes?"

"There are so _many_ of them," Watson said and sighed once more, but for much lighter reasons. "And you keep telling stories. How are we ever going to get packed if you keep telling stories?"

"Oh, you know most of them anyway," I murmured. "And at all the best parts, you were there."


End file.
